High-tech WRPS cruiser helps nab unlawful drivers

Regional Police have some high-tech help out on our roadways, thanks to a new specialized cruiser.

The WRPS cruiser has been used since January, and is equipped with a camera that scan your licence plate as you drive down the street.

Although it’s unique in the Region, it isn’t for police services in general.

Chief Bryan Larkin was on 570’s Mike Farwell Show on Tuesday.

He says this is already being used across the province, and Canada extensively.

“Including our Municipal By-Law Units, they’ve been using it for a number of years. Ironically, as we view ourselves as a progressive service – we were kind of a late adopter for a number of different reasons. That being said, last year we received a government grant to purchase an Automated Plate Reader.”

Larkin says this is just part of the technological evolution – as police need to modernize as well.

“The reality is, the Automated Licence Plate Reader can detect and query more than one-thousand licence plates while it’s travelling through the Region in an eight-ten hour shift. It’s designed for road safety, and to make our community safety – so it detects and tells the officer who is operating the system that a driver may be suspended, the plate or validation sticker may be expired, the driver may be wanted, the vehicle may be stolen, and/or there may be an Amber Alert for that vehicle.”

Larkin adds the scanner really processes information in the Ministry of Transportation databases to help officers do their function and perform.

“Since January, out of all the detections – we’ve laid around 325 charges. So obviously, it does provide some support and assistance. Technology impacts every day work, and as a police service we have to modernize as well – and this is just about giving our officers a frontline tool.”

WRPS are piloting this project through a government grant to see whether the impacts on road safety would warrant more. The current cruiser is housed with the Traffic Unit right now.

Meantime, there have been some concerns about privacy though, as the camera can scan any and all licence plates.

“Privacy is a big piece – and that was actually one of delays with moving this forward, as we wanted to make sure we had a Privacy Impact Statement. The cruiser, you’ll recognize, has three cameras on top – so it’s kind of unique. It is also labelled on the cruiser that it has an ‘Automated Licence Plate Reader’ – so we actually inform the public that this car is reading licence plates. So the reality it, is does scan people that are abiding laws – but that information is vetted from our system every 24 hours, so it’s basically deleted – and we also do an audit, to make sure we are compliant with the information and data we access.”

Larkin adds the next step will come in June, when WRPS will report on the first iteration of their audit.